Name the language
Here’s a recording of part of a story in a mystery language.
Do you know or can you guess which language it’s in and where it’s spoken?
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Here’s a recording of part of a story in a mystery language.
Do you know or can you guess which language it’s in and where it’s spoken?
This entry was posted on Sunday, May 24th, 2009 at 2:30 pm and is filed under Language, Quiz questions. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.
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May 24th, 2009 at 3:18 pm
Shot in the dark: Gujarati?
May 24th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
Sounds Romanian to me. I’m probably wrong, since it’ll probably one of those crazy Italian dialects that are barely spoken anymore…
May 24th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
I agree on the Romanian, but I’m probably wrong…I suck at these langauge quizes, but I love ‘em.
May 24th, 2009 at 7:22 pm
I’m useless at this because I thought I heard Italian, Spanish, Hindi and at the end it went quite oriental – maybe Vietnamese or Malaysian?
May 24th, 2009 at 7:43 pm
It’s got something to do with the Romance languages, or just highly coincidental that I heard things like “aquesto,” “levant-” etc
May 24th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
I’m guessing Romanian too, though I wouldn’t rule out crazy Italian dialects.
May 24th, 2009 at 11:33 pm
Maybe Filipino because of the influence of Spanish? Otherwise my first thought was also an obscure Italian dialect.
May 24th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
To me, it sounds Turkic. I will guess Kyrgyz. I will be very surprised if it turns out to be indeed any Romance language.
May 25th, 2009 at 12:34 am
Something in central Russia, I’d guess.
Definitely not Turkic: there’s not a single ö or ü in it.
May 25th, 2009 at 12:34 am
Well, “central”… I mean Mari or something geographically within, like, 1000 km of that. Just not Turkic. And not Russian of course.
May 25th, 2009 at 1:45 am
I’m hearing a romance language, too. I hear the “eu” and “ão” sounds from Portuguese. Is it Mirandese?
May 25th, 2009 at 2:22 am
Is it a form of Rhaeto-Romance?
May 25th, 2009 at 2:27 am
Romani?
May 25th, 2009 at 2:29 am
I didn’t understand much but it’s definitely Romance. Rumantsch?
May 25th, 2009 at 7:41 am
Sounds kind of Portuguese-y to me, and closer to Brazilian in terms of its singsong quality — I would off-hand guess it’s a Portuguese Creole? But I wouldn’t know which one except that it doesn’t sound quite like Papiamentu nor Cape Verdean, or at least I don’t think.
I hear words like “manjar (to eat)” (I’m hearing a lot of words with last-syllable stress, and I’m guessing a good number of these are the root verb forms where the final -r sound has been dropped as it happens in some Romance languages/dialects/creoles); “questa (this)” (the s is like sh in ship, as would be pronounced in Portuguese); and maybe “pena”(?) at the very end.
Wish the audio quality were better.
May 25th, 2009 at 8:37 am
If even David Marjanović doesn’t know, then how do you expect me to?
I agree with Doug.
How about a Brazilian, normally a Portuguese-speaker, speaking in, say, one of those things David suggested?
May 25th, 2009 at 10:44 am
Is it Roma?
May 25th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
Crown, surely it isn’t Brazilian Portuguese (I’m Brazilian) it isn’t also spanish, nor italian, nor French.
Sometimes it looks like Esperanto and any creole language, similar to Papiamento. But I wouldn’t say it is Papiamento, I have many doubts.
May 25th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
I think this is some sort of language spoken in Italy (maybe Piedmontese).
I am sure I can hear some romance features:
‘Leger’ – light??
‘Tots dus’ – like Catalan (both) ??
‘Manjar’ – to eat??
Its an interesting one!
Jim
May 25th, 2009 at 6:12 pm
I’m gonna take a wild guess ….. Ido?
May 25th, 2009 at 6:23 pm
A second, less wild, guess …. Asturian?
May 25th, 2009 at 6:47 pm
I’m narrowing my guess to a Swiss dialect. Oh what the heck, Surselvan?
May 26th, 2009 at 6:28 am
“Singsong quality”? “Wish the audio quality were better”? Sounds to me like something being played backwards.
May 26th, 2009 at 7:47 am
I have another guess: Macanese, aka Patuá.
May 26th, 2009 at 9:04 am
Interesting guesses – the language is Rumantsch Grischun which is spoken in the Swiss Canton of Grischun/Grigione/Grissons/Graubünden.
The recording comes from Lowlands-L, and is part of a story called “Il poleschet” (The Wren).
Here’s the text:
Il poleschet
Il poleschet aveva ses gnieu en la remisa dals chars. In di, ils vegls tuts dus han orsgulà – vulevan prender insatge per mangiar per lur giuvens – ed avevan laschà ils pitschens sul sulet.
Suenter ina urella, il bab poleschet returna a chasa.
“Tge è passà, uffants?”, el di. “Tgi va ha fatg questa chaussa dal mal? Tuts avais bler tema!”
and an English version:
The Wren
There once was a wren who had made his nest in a garage. He lived there with his family. One day he and his mate went out to look for some food to bring their chicks, leaving the young birds all alone.
After a while the father wren returned home.
“What’s been going on here?” he asked. “Has something happened? You children look scared to death!”
June 17th, 2009 at 10:23 pm
English isnt my first language but you made me understand clearly, thank you.